When the House considers the House of Lords' amendments to the Criminal Justice Bill, we intend to bring forward proposals for new arrangements for deciding the release of discretionary life sentence prisoners, which will comply with the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in the cases of Mr. Thynne and others.

If these amendments are approved by Parliament and Mr. Thynne is still detained when they come into effect, his case will be considered in accordance with them. In the meantime, the case will be dealt with under the existing arrangements for considering the release of life sentence prisoners, and is due to be considered by the local review committee in February 1992.